The present disclosure generally relates to characterization of optical elements, and specifically, to characterizing wide field of view diffractive optical elements.
In many cases, conventional depth camera systems use a diffractive optical element to generate a structured light pattern. The structured light pattern is then projected into a local area. The depth camera assembly then images the local area and uses the structured light in the image to determine depth for objects in the images. But, optical error has a tendency to increase as one moves further off-axis in the structured light pattern. In particular, in cases where the structured light pattern has a wide field of view (e.g., 150 degrees), optical aberrations (e.g., non-uniform brightness) can be significant. For example, brightness and/or distortion can vary depending with distance from the center of the structure light pattern. Conventional optical characterization systems do not exist to characterize devices that create structured light patterns over a wide field of view.